David Boaz

Not President Thabo Mbeki, of course. But his brother, the outspoken political commentator Moeletsi Mbeki, turns out to be one of nine people banned from the airwaves by the South African Broadcasting Corporation, which is, in the words of the Washington Post, increasingly “reverting to its apartheid-era roots as a tool for government propaganda.”

The new top news executive at SABC, Snuki Zikalala, is a former spokesman for the African National Congress-dominated government who “received his journalistic training in Communist Eastern Europe.” A new report says that he is responsible for the ban on nine government critics.

In the last days of apartheid, some libertarians pointed out to South Africa’s rulers that if they left a government broadcasting operation in place, they would one day regret the way a different government would use it. Looks like that day has come.

Meanwhile, you can’t hear Moeletsi Mbeki on South African radio and TV. But you can read his thoughts in this Cato Foreign Policy Briefing.

NPR has a report this morning that it’s looking more and more like Fidel Castro is terminally ill and will not return to power. NPR and Reuters both suggest that younger brother Raul Castro may open up the economy and even the political system to some extent.

Meanwhile, after 47 years of tyranny, some leftists still revere the Cuban dictator. A “colossal portrait” depicting Castro as “a champion of civil rights” will be unveiled in Central Park on November 8.

If you’re not into fantasy football and the like, policy buffs around the country can now play Fantasy Congress, a website created by students at Claremont McKenna College. As the New York Times explains,
Just as in fantasy football or baseball, each player picks a team ââ?¬â? in this case, 4 …

If you’re not into fantasy football and the like, policy buffs around the country can now play Fantasy Congress, a website created by students at Claremont McKenna College. As the New York Times explains,

Just as in fantasy football or baseball, each player picks a team — in this case, 4 senators and 12 House members of varying seniority levels — and competes with other players in a league typically managed by a friend or a co-worker….

Players accumulate points as the legislators they have chosen go about their business on Capitol Hill. A House member or senator earns five points for introducing a bill or an amendment, and more points for negotiating successfully each step in the legislative process.

Yikes! Yes, that’s right: In this nightmare Congress, much as in the real one, you “win” by introducing laws and getting them passed. No points for keeping your mitts off our money, or for failing to rush in with a legislative pander after every headline or “Dateline” story.

And so yes, that means that the top-scoring House member is Mr. Pork, Don Young of Alaska. “Don Young’s Way” is not just a bridge in Alaska, it’s pretty much the story of Washington. And now the story of Fantasy Washington.

Hat tip: Ryan Posly.

In the Wall Street Journal, Dan Henninger writes admiringly of Sen. Joe Lieberman and the Republicans who are flocking to Connecticut to campaign for him, notably Jack Kemp. The Boston Globe adds that many Republican donors close to the White House are donating to Lieberman: former Bush campaign manager Joe …

From the Washington Post:
Recess is dangerous. There’s all that name-calling, roughhousing and bullying. And the fast running! Why a child might trip, fall, even — and perhaps more important — sue.

Given such perils, Willett Elementary School, south of Boston, has cracked down on tag and other “chasing games.” Pia Durkin, …

From the Washington Post:

Recess is dangerous. There’s all that name-calling, roughhousing and bullying. And the fast running! Why a child might trip, fall, even — and perhaps more important — sue.

Given such perils, Willett Elementary School, south of Boston, has cracked down on tag and other “chasing games.” Pia Durkin, the district superintendent, told the Sun Chronicle in Attleboro, Mass., that children’s energies should be better directed toward “good, sound, supervised play.” 

So they’ll be prepared for good, sound, supervised lives.

In the Wall Street Journal, Dan Henninger writes admiringly of Sen. Joe Lieberman and the Republicans who are flocking to Connecticut to campaign for him, notably Jack Kemp. The Boston Globe adds that many Republican donors close to the White House are donating to Lieberman: former Bush campaign manager Joe Allbaugh, former ambassador Mel Sembler, former Sen. Don Nickles, “and the heads of several Texas-based corporations.” Republican strategists tell the Globe that Karl Rove’s publicized phone call to Lieberman was a signal to Republican donors and politicians.

What are these Republicans doing? They’re subordinating every tenet of the Republican philosophy to the war in Iraq. That’s the only issue on which Lieberman is in line with Republican or conservative principles. Lieberman has a lifetime rating of 17 from the American Conservative Union. But maybe he’s getting better? No, his rating was 8 in 2005. On government spending, the National Taxpayers Union rates him 9, slightly worse than Dodd, Feinstein, or Boxer.

Lieberman votes against tax cuts and spending cuts. He’s coauthor of a bill to implement the Kyoto Protocol. He votes for gun control and mandatory seat-belt laws, and against tort reform. He votes to restrict political speech (the McCain-Feingold act) and to punish people for “hate crimes.”

It’s understandable that Republicans don’t want Ned Lamont in the Senate. But to campaign for a lifelong big-government liberal simply because he supports President Bush’s increasingly unsupportable war in Iraq is to declare limited government across a wide range of issues less important than this failing war.

Suddenly, a week after David Kirby and I published our study “The Libertarian Vote,” journalists and politicos are taking note of libertarian voters, along with disgruntled economic conservatives and social conservatives. In a story on our study, The Economist writes:
AMERICA may be the land of the free, but Americans who favour …

Americans who favour both economic and social freedom have no political home this election.